SHAR­LENE RAM­PER­SAD

Three po­lice of­fi­cers who stopped a 14-year-old girl from jump­ing off the Gov­ern­ment Plaza Parkade in Port- of-Spain on Wednes­day, will re­ceive com­men­da­tions from the act­ing Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Mc Don­ald Ja­cob.

This was the word from T&T Po­lice Ser­vice pub­lic in­for­ma­tion of­fi­cer Sheri­don Hill at Thurs­day's week­ly press con­fer­ence at the Po­lice Ad­min­is­tra­tion build­ing in Port-of-Spain.

On Wednes­day af­ter­noon, act­ing Cpl George and PCs An­drews and Nanan, of the North East­ern Di­vi­sion Task Force, were on pa­trol in down­town Port-of-Spain when passers-by alert­ed them that a young woman was seen sit­ting on a rail­ing at the top of the Parkade.

Two mem­bers of the pub­lic were try­ing to talk the girl off the rail­ing and An­drews took over from them.

While he was speak­ing to the girl, George qui­et­ly ap­proached her from be­hind and grabbed her, tak­ing her off the rail­ing and to safe­ty.

Police officers prevent a young girl from jumping off the top floor of the Government Parkade Plaza on Wednesday.

She was tak­en to the Cen­tral Po­lice Sta­tion and left in the care of her moth­er and oth­er of­fi­cers.

Hill said the three of­fi­cers em­bod­ied every­thing in the TTPS’ mot­to: To pro­tect and serve with pride.

“We com­mend them for fol­low­ing through with their train­ing in deal­ing with pre­car­i­ous sit­u­a­tions and en­gag­ing in life-pre­serv­ing ne­go­ti­a­tions with cit­i­zens in dis­tress and in need of help to re­solve their cri­sis,” Hill said.

“We are par­tic­u­lar­ly pleased with the quick think­ing and co­or­di­na­tion in bring­ing the girl to safe­ty un­der ex­treme pres­sure, know­ing the eyes of the pub­lic were on them,” he added.

Hill urged oth­er of­fi­cers to note “sit­u­a­tion­al aware­ness” and strive to re­spond in the same way George, An­drews and Nanan did.

He said the of­fi­cers will re­ceive com­men­da­tions from act­ing Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Ja­cob and the ex­ec­u­tive of the TTPS to­day.

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